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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29302653">Careworn</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/gentledusk/pseuds/gentledusk'>gentledusk</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>F-Zero (Video Games), F-Zero GP Legend, F-Zero: Falcon Densetsu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Ambiguous/Open Ending, Gen, Time Travel, possibly</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 07:35:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,981</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29302653</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/gentledusk/pseuds/gentledusk</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>When she wakes up in her childhood bedroom, the first thing she does is pinch herself.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Andy Summer &amp; Jody Summer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Careworn</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jody’s always been a practical person, never one to spend long quibbling over what to do. So when she wakes up in her childhood bedroom, in a body that takes up less space than it should, the first thing she does is pinch herself.</p><p>It hurts. Jody does it again, lifting a too-small hand up to pinch her other arm. It hurts just as much as the first time.</p><p>Well, then. Time to investigate the situation. Throwing the blanket off, she swings her too-short legs off the bed, standing up gingerly in an effort to prevent any stumbling on uncoordinated limbs. A glance at the digital clock by her bed tells her that it’s 7AM on a Sunday, and that the date is, for some reason, set to over a decade in the past. Normally she’d dismiss it as a simple malfunction, or perhaps an ill-thought-out prank, but combined with the sheer detail of the room she’s in and the state of her body...it leads her to some interesting possible conclusions, and she doesn’t like any of them one bit.</p><p>Wobbling over to the closet (unacceptable, she’ll have to work on her coordination immediately), Jody slides the door open to find clothes in the colours and styles she vaguely remembers owning as a young girl. More important is the full-length mirror on the wall beside it that allows her to get her first proper look at herself since she’d opened her eyes to this bizarre replica of her past.</p><p>She’s...small. Skinny, even, enough that her soft pink pyjamas hang a little loosely on her frame. Long, messy brown hair, wide blue eyes, short (fragile) limbs. She unbuttons her shirt just enough to prod at the skin of her shoulder, eyes narrowing as her fingers come into contact with distinctly <em>un-</em>synthetic skin. Either this really is her younger body, or it’s a very convincing fake. But why? Discarding the lucid dreaming theory and taking into account the possibility of illusions or virtual reality...why go so far as to recreate her childish form?</p><p>A knock sounds at the door.</p><p>“Jody? Are you awake?”</p><p>Jody freezes, mind racing a million miles a minute as she stumbles towards the door. She snags the blanket off the bed as she goes, because while she’d know that voice anywhere, Andy is <em> dead. </em> This is in all likelihood just an elaborate trap that she hasn’t managed to figure her way out of yet, and she’s not going to let anyone use her brother’s memory like this. In this body, her hand-to-hand combat’s bound to be shot, and there’s precious little in the room that can be used as a weapon. The blanket, at least, might be able to blind someone for a moment, maybe trip or even bind them in a pinch. She refuses to consider what she’ll do if someone or some <em> thing </em> that looks like Andy is on the other side of the door, because there’s no way in hell she’s going to let that stop her but fighting a monster wearing her brother’s face would be hard enough even if she had her own adult body and all the weapons at its disposal.</p><p>She takes a deep breath and slides the door open. Andy is standing there on the other side.</p><p>“You’re up early,” he says, tilting his head. “Did you have a nightmare?”</p><p>Jody stands rooted to the floor, barely registering the blanket slipping out of her grasp as she tips her head back and <em> stares. </em> It looks like her brother alright, but not the one she’d last seen ready to give his life away. This one is younger, with less lines on his face, dressed in an old t-shirt and loose sweatpants and kneeling down now to look her in the eye. His eyes are as blue as the ones she’d seen in the mirror, without any scar above them, staring patiently back at her as he waits for her to reply.</p><p>Later, she will blame her overactive tear ducts on her young body, her staggered lurch forward as a child’s instinctive seeking of comfort. She will rationalize that if this is a dream, then it doesn’t matter what she does. She tries to hold back, she <em> tries, </em>but at that moment all thoughts of rationality flee her mind. All that is left is her brother, six months dead yet somehow a young adult again, arms spreading wide open to catch her as she buries her face in his neck. He says nothing, but his hand rubs soothing circles into her back, just like he always used to back when she was too young to control her tears. He’s solid in her arms and around her, smelling faintly of coffee and flowers, breath comfortingly steady next to her ear. He’s here, warm and whole and not scattered into thousands of pieces across the cold and unforgiving reaches of space; not burned to nothingness in the heat of a devastating explosion. He’s here and she doesn’t know whether she wants to yank herself away so she can slap him or press her face harder into his shoulder and never let go.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” he asks, making no move to detach her.</p><p>Jody just shakes her head. How could she even begin to explain?</p><p>Andy falls silent once more, holding her there on the floor until she stops shaking and tears stop streaming freely from her eyes. She draws in a shuddering breath, finally managing to pry her arms off him, grimacing at the tear stains she’s gotten on his shirt, the indignity of even breaking down to begin with when she still isn’t even sure if he’s real or not. She opens her mouth, either to apologize or to yell at him, but before she can get a word out she finds herself being scooped right up off the ground.</p><p>“I’m not a child,” she protests, conveniently forgetting the fact that she is, in fact, a child right now. “Put me down!”</p><p>Andy just smiles. “Of course you aren’t,” he agrees, and she has no idea how he manages to make it sound sincere instead of patronizing. “But to me, you’ll always be my little sister.”</p><p>“I can walk,” she insists. “Put me down!”</p><p>Andy of course does no such thing, ignoring her complaints with an older sibling’s ease of long practice as he carries her down the hall. He comes to a stop once they reach the sitting room, lowering her gently onto the sofa and draping her blanket (when had he picked that up?) over her shoulders.</p><p>“I’ll be right back.”</p><p>Because Jody isn’t actually a child, she doesn’t reach out to grab at him to prevent him from leaving, despite the spark of anxiety that jolts through her at the sight of his retreating back. Instead she sits, staring blankly in the direction he’d gone off in, trying to make sense of these bizarre circumstances and all the questions swirling around in her head.</p><p>Andy does indeed come back, unlike the last time he’d parted ways with her. He’s carrying a steaming mug, which he blows at gently before setting it down on the coffee table in front of her. She reaches out for it, frowning when her arm doesn’t reach quite as far as it should. The drink could be spiked, of course, but there are less roundabout ways to kill her than fabricating an entire illusion of her childhood home for her brother to comfort her in and <em> then </em>slip some poison into her drink.</p><p>Despite her morbid thoughts, the drink still smells delicious. It isn’t her favourite coffee, the kind he used to make for her, but the rich scent of hot cocoa still sends warmth seeping through her entire body.</p><p>“Wait,” Andy says.</p><p>She looks up to see a hand with a wet cloth hovering in front of her. She sighs, but sets the mug down and lets her brother gently dab at the dried tear tracks on her face.</p><p>“Do you want to talk about it?”</p><p>Again, Jody moves to shake her head, but—if this is a dream, what does it matter what she tells him? If this is a trap, what does it matter if she tells him what most everyone already knows?</p><p>“I…” she starts. Her voice wavers more than she’d like, so she frowns and tries again. “I <em> saw </em> you die. I saw you shield me from that explosion—and then after you weren’t really dead after all, I saw Ryu come back without you. Nothing but your helmet was left. But I’d accepted that you were...gone. I accepted it, because I knew the brother I’d known would be proud to give his life to protect people. So...<em>why? </em> Why...<em>how</em> can you be here now?”</p><p>Andy’s eyebrows are raised, but otherwise he shows no reaction to the (if this is truly past Andy) frankly absurd things she knows she’s spewing. That by itself doesn’t tell her much of anything—though her brother has always been free with his smiles, it’s rare to see him display anything like confusion, sadness, or fear. Real or fake, what the Andy in front of her thinks of her words...Jody doesn’t know.</p><p>“...I’m here, Jody,” he says after a few moments, gathering her up into his arms. He even begins to stroke her hair a little, which would be embarrassing if there were anyone else here to witness it.</p><p>“You’re here <em> now,</em>” she retorts. “What about whenever I wake up again? What about ten, fifteen years from now, when you don’t so much as speak to me for <em> years </em>before dying for the greater good? What then?”</p><p>Her lower lip has absolutely not jutted outwards into a pout, because she’s not actually a child. If she repeats it enough times, maybe her body will finally get the memo and she’ll return to her stronger, older self with the stern face that’s scary enough to make the Director cry. She could never, would never resent her brother for doing everything he could to keep her safe—to keep <em> everyone </em> safe. But she still can’t help wishing they’d had some more time together before he’d gone off and died for good this time. Her own safety be damned—a letter, a cryptic message, some small hint or <em> anything </em>would’ve been better than the years of silence spent wondering why she’d been the only one to be given the grace of surviving that fateful night.</p><p>She can’t see his face this time, but she can feel his arms stiffen around her. She wants to demand answers, to demand to know who he <em> really </em>is, anything—but Andy just squeezes her tighter and dashes every thought of ripping apart whatever tenuous peace they may have here.</p><p>As artificial as her body may be (may have been? will be?), she’s still human. And the very human part of her that still remains wants nothing more than to curl up in her brother’s arms like the child she appears to be. She shouldn’t succumb to sentiment so easily—what if she really is trapped somehow, and her team needs her? What if letting her guard down is just what some unknown enemy wants?</p><p>“I won’t leave you, Jody.” Andy’s voice is firm, yet gentle as he resumes stroking her hair. “I promise.”</p><p>She’s not sure whether she wants to laugh or cry at the words. She takes a deep breath, steels herself, and thinks with all her might about how this is all a trick, an illusion, and she’s ready to return to reality right <em> now</em>—but even then, Andy remains frustratingly (reassuringly) solid in her grasp.</p><p>“I won’t leave you alone,” he says, softer this time, and Jody shuts her eyes and wishes fervently that she could figure out what the hell is going on.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This too was an unfinished draft from a while ago (2018 to be exact) that I finally got the drive to finish. Originally it was meant to be a much longer story, but I am admittedly terrible at long plots and don't have much energy nowadays so it got turned into a oneshot instead.</p><p>I was thinking of doing a B-side from Andy's POV, but I also wonder if this stands just fine on its own. I guess for now it'll be marked complete?</p></blockquote></div></div>
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